Which DVCS would work best on Windows for my scenario?

Question

At work I use ClearCase and SourceSafe, but have found some time to do some time to code for myself enroute thanks to a disposable laptop.

However, I wish I had a lightweight VCS on my system using which I would be able to make changes to my code during the commute and then push/grab them from my Linux systems.

I use git on my home system, but I can't really get it working on Windows. I don't want all that cygwin hack.

If it does not run natively on Windows, it just won't do.

What have you guys tried on your Windows system? Something that YOU use.

The big player at the moment seems to be Mercurial?

What would be best for a one (or maybe two) man team?

I just need to maintain :

1. Versioned copies of source code.

Checking in and out should be as less obtrusive as possible.

I am looking forward to a multiple Undo kind of feature (like that in an EMacs buffer) but persistent.

1. I really like the way git keeps track of lines moving between files in a source code set

2. I should be able to move part(s)/sub tree(s) of the source tree (each sub tree implies a module/plugin to my the main software I am building) to an archival system either completly or partially and restore them back from the archive as and when required and the system should track any changes to this tree as well.

I actually want to experiment with my code as much as possible without me manually keeping track of what I modified and what I need to undo once I try out some idea, so that I am back to where I want to continue from.

Notes : A similar topic came up a year ago : http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4670/dvcs-choices-whats-good-for-windows I hope things have changed, and I really want people to share their own, real life experiences. Not something they recommend without using it or they think will work.

Answer 1

I for one have switched from bazaar to git, and I've been pleased.

Answer 2

Bazaar and Mercurial both work very well on Windows. I posted in the question you linked, and since then, both have improved their Windows support even more. Using them is easy and flawless, and they even have GUIs if you swing that way.

Answer 3

If you've a Clearcase background, why don't you take a look at Plastic SCM? Check this link, it will show you how it works on a distributed setup (and of course all the basic operations) http://codicesoftware.blogspot.com/2010/03/distributed-development-for-windows.html.

You won't miss any of the "good" clearcase features but all the shortcomings are simply gone (faster, installs on 45seconds, no cumbersome setup to use on a mixed Win/Linux scenario, built-in ACLs, excellent branching and merging, much better common ancestor algorithm, visualizations, better GUI, and you still have "selectors" in case you miss config_specs, but not being mandatory)